Ovulation gives women's brains a boost

THE size of a woman's brain changes throughout her menstrual cycle, with some areas growing by as much as 2 per cent in the run-up to ovulation, when women are at their most fertile.

So say Belinda Pletzer and colleagues at the University of Salzburg, Austria, who took MRI scans of the brains of women during their monthly cycles.

In women not taking the pill, the team found an increase in the volume of grey matter in the right parahippocampal and fusiform gyri, areas of the brain involved in spatial location and facial recognition (Brain Research, DOI: 10.1016/j.brainres.2010.06.019).

This boosts women's abilities to recognise faces, bodies and landscapes, says Pletzer, adding that this may help them to locate a high-quality mating partner.

The team found that the effect is short-lived, however. After ovulation, rising levels of progesterone cause the gyri to shrink back.

The team also found that ...

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